Independence and categoricity in universal classes

This is the title of a talk given at the Seminář z algebry at Masaryk university on March 16, 2017. The talk presents the corresponding two papers.

Abstract

Universal classes are a general model-theoretic framework introduced in the seventies by Saharon Shelah to study certain classes of modules. It encompasses several natural algebraic objects, such as vector spaces and locally finite groups.

I will present generalizations to universal classes of several concepts and results of linear algebra. For example, a universal class which has a single model of a "high-enough" infinite size has a single model in every high-enough size. Moreover, such classes admit an independence notion generalizing linear independence in vector spaces. I will also discuss a more general framework (also due to Shelah), abstract elementary classes, and conjectured extensions of these results there.

References